What it takes to run a WRC rally

For one week of the year, one lucky country becomes the center of the rallying universe as it welcomes the World Rally Championship to town.

The next, it’s almost forgotten as attention swivels to what’s next: the Tarmac roads of Gran Canaria.

Kenya is in that position this week as the rallying fraternity descends on Africa for its sole visit of 2025 – the third of eventually 14 stops on rallying’s global tour.

But just because the rally only holds our attention for, at most, seven days, that doesn’t mean its existence is only temporary. Far from it.

Organizing a round of the WRC is an all-year round process that requires the utmost attention-to-detail, resourcefulness, planning and, above all, passion.

Anita Passalis knows this better than most. As clerk of the course of one of the world’s most prestigious rallies, Acropolis Rally Greece, since 2001, she’s been at the helm through various eras and overseen the event through its European Rally Championship tenure and worked to return it to the world calendar.

There’s therefore no better person to talk to to provide us mere mortals with an insight into what it takes to run a round of the WRC.

How to get involved

Like most roles in rallying, there is no one-size-fits-all approach to becoming part of an international rallying’s organizing team.

No two organizers’ stories are the same, but Passalis’ tale is intriguing.

Born on the island of Corfu, her first contact with motorsport was watching the Circuit of Corfu, but she was also attracted to Greece’s WRC round as it started under the famous Acropolis.

Meeting her future husband, Nikos, at 18, she became his co-driver in local and national events across Greece before the pair hung up their helmets in order to start a family.

To fix their rallying itch once their son arrived in the world they became marshals, and soon Anita worked up to be a steward and competitor relations officer for the Acropolis and Halkidiki (which used to be part of the ERC) rallies.

Coupled to her experience of actually competing, she very quickly established a broad skillset.

“When I was the CRO, I was also obliged to know regulations, to know everything that is between the organizer and the competitors. I had to give solutions or give answers to certain questions or whatever,” Passalis tells DirtFish. “So I had to be educated, let’s say, in this game.”

That ultimately paved the way for her to become clerk of the course of her country’s biggest motorsport event.

“I was active all the time – I was reading, I was participating in the meetings that the stewards and the clerk of the course at that time had with the FIA,” she explains. “So someone understood that I could make it one step further. That’s how I’ve been, let’s say, more involved with the WRC event.”

Passalis feels her knowledge of all aspects of a rally is a big benefit for her current role, and uses a simple business analogy to illustrate her point.

“It’s like someone who is keen to be a factory owner or to start a business – you have to know the production process.

“You have to know from scratch how it will come to you, the product, the procedure, whatever. So in my case it was like this because I knew what was involved in the entire process.”

The scale of the operation

Again, not every single event is the same, but in the case of Acropolis Rally Greece there are “at least six” people working on the event full-time.

However, that number balloons to around 600 during the week of the rally.

“I’m sure there are other events that are more,” Passalis points out. “And this is not mentioning the police, the firefighters, paramedics and all these people that are supporting the events, but they are not in our capacity.

“All year round we have at least six working on the rally because we are keeping in touch with sponsors, with WRC Promoter, with FIA, with other events and so on. So we are six in a permanent base.

“And the rally week, with all marshals and everybody around, the organization is something like 600 people – all marshals, safety marshals, commanders, safety officers, stage commanders, course guards, everybody.”

It’s all a huge effort from everybody involved.

What happens outside rally week?

But what do they actually do? How does a WRC event go from an idea to a sporting contest fit for world champion drivers and millions of global viewers?

“As soon as the previous event finishes, what I am doing is checking the routes,” Passalis says. “This is not my obligation, there are route coordinators and things like that, but I enjoy it. It’s something that I want to take care of.

“So I’m visiting the stages, looking at which stages had problems, if they are OK, if they are destroyed a lot, if all the stage furniture has been taken away or if spectators have picked up all their litter because we have to think about the environment.

“In the old days, it was not like that. But I feel, let’s say, proud that I’ve started and I continue it like this. And I think that many understood how important it is, at least in this event. And it is a good example for other events in my country as well. So this is the main thing that I’m doing the next week after the finish of the event.”

But after such an intense week, it’s important that everyone takes some time to relax, reflect and reconnect with their everyday lives.

“It’s a huge thing to sleep at 2am and get up at 5am during the rally week, so we need, let’s say, a month to get some vacations, then we start over.”

Starting over means learning what worked well at the previous edition, and seeking ways to improve the offering. Often this will mean studying the maps to see how the rally route can be tweaked.

“Every year we are not following the same, let’s say, example. We want to get some new things, to combine stages, to combine regions that we are reaching,” Passalis explains.

“We have the debrief, of course, before we organize the steps to prepare the next event. And from then on, we are in contact with locals, with their support, to educate them on what we want to do for next year, looking at their response and their ability to help us and to help them. It’s a mutual, let’s say, connection with them.

“And from then on we’ve started with the details of the stages, writing the roadbooks and drafting an itinerary and all the event documentation. We also have to start appointing people and assigning them various tasks for the event itself, like for example the start ceremony.

“This is an ongoing process before we start to make it more official, because it takes time to do all this.”

The 2024-25 period has been even more intense in the case of the Acropolis, as the team only has a nine-month lead time instead of 12 thanks to the rally moving forwards from September to June in the calendar.

“So all these procedures we’ve just talked about happened between October and the end of December,” Passalis continues.

“After Christmas and the 1st of January, we’ve started with documentation: reading up, getting up-to-date with the new regulations, teaching people and having briefings with them from time to time to keep them alerted, educated and trained on the new systems and all these things.

“And now, with three months to go, we are finalizing all different aspects of the event. This hopefully gives you a rough idea of what we do, but of course every time and every day there are items that are arising and we have to give solutions.

“For me it’s difficult to say or to describe what the procedure is because it’s an ongoing process. Every year is different. Let’s say problems are arising and you can’t always anticipate them, so it is difficult to express it in words.”

What’s abundantly clear, however, is planning is everything.

What happens on rally week?

In a similar fashion to the drivers themselves, the hard work is done by rally week. It’s simply time to perform.

In the case of being a rally organizer, what you want is for everything to run without hitch – to never be the center of attention, but let the sporting contest you’ve facilitated hog the headlines.

“You are satisfied if you didn’t have any accidents or crews that did not take the result they were expecting or wishing to have because of, let’s say, a mistake by a part of the organization,” Passalis says.

“You are also satisfied if all spectators and if all the professionals, even journalists, cameramen, photographers, do not have any complaints apart from the ones that they normally have. To achieve this requires preparation beforehand.

“You can never predict or control exactly what is going to happen or what can go wrong, but you can be prepared for it. If before the start of the event you have thought about it and have a procedure on how to deal with it, and you will not have a negative result, this for me means everything has gone well.

“Not to have everybody with a big smile, because this is impossible! But at least you were not the one someone could blame for something that happened.”

But there must also be an ability to think live on your feet, as exemplified last year at the Acropolis when a violent storm caused havoc in the service park on Saturday night.

“Last year I don’t remember if you were in Lamia?” Passalis asks.

I was – it was an unpleasant drive back from the EKO superspecial to our accommodation. But it was a lot worse for the organizers.

“I was moving from one room to the other and moving all the equipment that we had after the roof collapsed on rally control. So you can understand you, there’s always something [to do]!

“We had to move rally control and the stewards’ room because on Sunday we had to run the last day with the powerstage and the winners and all these things.

“The stewards came and they could not believe that their room was there and that the rally control was functioning in another place of the building. It was something just to keep us, you know, busy!”

There absolutely is never a dull moment at the helm of a WRC event. But above all, it has to be enjoyed as well.

“Absolutely,” Passalis smiles.

“It is a big satisfaction to be part of such a great team where you have people, colleagues, who can all work together to give the best solution to whatever arises.

“After working together for many years, everybody knows who can solve this or that, or how many people can do and cooperate together to do their best to solve it.

“This is a big pleasure for me.”

So when you’re next watching your favorite WRC driver attack a gorgeous piece of road, spare a thought for those who have made it happen. The drivers are heroes, but they’re not the only ones.